220 
TRAVELS m CENTRAL AFRICA. 
hat^ presented a sorry spectacle ; but without a murmur as to her 
own serious discomforts,, imaginable to the full extent by her sex 
only,, she had ever a cheering word to give our people ; and I avow^ 
that had it not been for her pluck, I should have been abandoned 
by my followers over and over again. 
After half an hour’s march the water diminished^ and we wended 
our way through a dense forest^ suffocated with the same rank 
grass,, until one p.m.^ having made three brief halts, when we 
arrived at a now deserted kraal called Augur, situated on a slight 
eminence above the general surface. The trees in the immediate 
vicinity had been cleared for the construction of stages in the kraal, 
thus a free circulation of air was admitted, affording inexpressible 
relief. The march had been most trying in consequence of the 
density and height of the grass. The trees we had remarked en 
route were principally mimosa and a species of Ficus, with occasional 
fine cactus. We might have reached Adael, Poncet’s station in the 
Phol, ere sunset, but all were suffering so much from fatigue, that 
a halt until the following morn was determined upon. 
Atchwack tells me that the kraal is now, during the rainy season, 
untenable from the presence of the destructive tsetse fly, called 
here the mau, I had as yet seen none, and hoped our horses would 
escape, but Atchwack said to-morrow’s march might prove trouble- 
some, as the fly was knowmto exist in the bush in advance of us. 
The chief, a more intelligent man than ordinary, states that the 
sting of the mau, if in the head or spine of a bullock, causes speedy 
death, but if in the body, the animal might linger a week or ten 
days ; but death is inevitable unless a part of the root of a tree 
called Tshol goote is administered internally, and rubbed well into 
the hide ; the animal might then recover. The fly occupies a certain 
bush, well known to the negroes ; at no great distance cattle may 
